1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to processing prescription requests and, more particularly, to an apparatus and method for processing prescription requests submitted by physicians via, for example, a telephone or other remote device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Patients often require medication during the course of receiving health care services. The medication typically cannot be purchased over the counter, and must be prescribed by a physician. The physician must also determine an appropriate therapy for the medication. The therapy can include, for example, selection of the appropriate medication (or drug), medication strength, and dosage. The therapy must also be varied based on the individual patient. For example, consider two patients who are suffering from the same illness. The therapy for the first patient may not be appropriate for the second patient due to various physical differences such as age, weight, prior medical history or condition, etc.
Next, the physician must prepare a prescription request which contains all the necessary information regarding the therapy. This can be done, for example, manually or telephonically. Manual preparation requires writing the information on a prescription form. The patient then submits the prescription form to a pharmacist, who subsequently fills the prescription (i.e., prepares the medication). This process, however, can be very time-consuming and problematic for patients that require immediate dosages of the medication.
In order to at least minimize the amount of time required before a patient can receive the prescribed medication, physicians often place a telephone call to the pharmacy and submit the prescription request telephonically. The prescription request would then be filled by the pharmacist and the medication subsequently retrieved by the patient. This would eliminate, or at least reduce, the amount of time which the patient must wait for the medication.
We have determined that there are various problems associated with telephone prescription requests. First, the prescription request must be submitted to a registered pharmacist. Thus, the pharmacist is interrupted from the preparation of other prescription requests. These interruptions can result in significant increases in the amount of time required to fill all the prescription requests received at the pharmacy. The interruptions also add to operational costs because additional pharmacist time is required to fill the prescription requests. Furthermore, the physician must interrupt scheduled patient examinations in order to contact the pharmacy and submit the prescription request. There are other times, for example, when it is more convenient for a physician to designate a predetermined time interval to contact a pharmacy and submit multiple prescription requests. Although convenient to the physician, such a solution may not be beneficial to the pharmacist.
No solution currently exists to address these problems; namely, providing a cost-effective and efficient way to submit an audible prescription request. There exist, however, various methods and systems that address other prescription related needs of physicians and pharmacists.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,883,370, incorporated herein in its entirety by reference thereto, discloses an automated method for filling drug prescriptions. The method attempts to verify a match between the doctor's prescription form and the drug selected from the pharmacy's inventory to fill the prescription. While effective at ensuring that the proper drug has been dispensed, the method of the '370 patent does not address the problems associated with submitting prescription requests and processing the prescriptions for use by patients.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,970,462, incorporated herein in its entirety by reference thereto, discloses an on-line pharmacy automated refill system. The '462 patent provides a limited ability to receive and process certain prescription information over the telephone. However, the system disclosed in the '462 patent is limited in use to refills of prescriptions. There is no ability to submit an original prescription request or make changes to the therapy during refill, as these actions require intervention from a physician.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,666,492, incorporated herein in its entirety by reference thereto, discloses a flexible computer based pharmaceutical care cognitive services management system and method. The system of the '492 patent provides various benefits to physicians and pharmacists. However, it does not address certain problems associated with processing prescription requests such as processing new prescriptions.
In addition, existing systems, while capable of addressing numerous prescription-related needs, simply do not provide a cost-effective and efficient ability to submit and process specialized prescription requests such as, for example, audible prescription requests.
Accordingly, there exists a need for a prescription processing network capable of receiving specialized prescription requests such as audible prescription requests.
There also exists a need for a prescription processing network that accepts audible changes in prescription therapy.
There exists a further need for a prescription processing network which allows a physician to conveniently submit audible prescription requests.
There exists a still further need for a prescription processing network capable of receiving audible prescription requests without interrupting a pharmacist from preparing existing prescriptions.